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Over the last two weekends we have had the most amazing fall weather. Although I still have mixed feeling about living in the suburbs, one of the things I love is all of the amazing tress, especially in the spring and fall. Our neighborhood is just a rainbow of bright colors.

I took this shot at Chestnut Hill College when I was there for a meeting the other day. The sky was amazing.

Here are a few from a hike we did last weekend in Wissahickon Park.

And this weekend the ice skating rink at Dilworth Plaza opened, and the girls and Dave were one of the first skaters on the ice (I was happily on the sideline taking pictures).

The ice skating crew.

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In July I headed up to Stony Brook to celebrate Brandon’s graduation from high school. He’s headed to Boston University in the fall. It was great to catch up with the Coughlin clan, including my dad who came up from Va.

The big graduate.

  

Pam, Brandon and Brittany, who came home for the weekend from school in Baltimore.

The family crew: Pam, Michelle, Steve, me, Brandon, Pam, and Dad.

Steve and Michelle came up from Florida and it was great to see them. It’s been years.

 

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The girls have shared a room since Lauren was born. Now that they’re 8 1/2 and 5 1/2 we thought it was time that they got their own space. Over the last several months Dave has been working to convert the guest room to Lauren’s room. It needed a lot of work – plaster walls, 100+ year old insulation in the walls, etc. – he tore it down to the studs and rebuilt the entire thing. And now it’s done! She moved in a few weeks ago and has loved it. I thought there might be tears on the first night, and there were, but from Sophie, not Lauren. Sophie has moved herself down to the bottom bunk in her room and put up a “knock before entering sign,” but has adjusted. We’ll be doing a redecoration job on her’s soon.

Here’s the final product:

As you may have guessed, the theme is pink, purple, and unicorns. In the second picture you can see the built in shelves that Dave made. It’s now one of the nicest rooms in the house!

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In October the Sharps left for their eight month adventure down the East Coast and into the Bahamas. We were lucky enough to meet them in December in Key West, and lucky again to meet up with them in The Exumas, Bahamas, for spring break. It was amazing! We leaving a cold, snowy Philly and it was warm AND beautiful!

SATURDAY

We left Saturday morning, flew to Nassau, and then took the sketchiest plane I’ve ever been on to Staniel Key. Only a 30 minute flight, thank God. There was electrical tape holding some of the lights up, and not all seat belts worked, I’m not kidding.

Here we are taking up almost half the plane. They had to seat us according to weight.

During a stop over at another island, Sophie jumped up to sit right behind the pilots.

Here’s a shot of Staniel Key from the plane. By far the most populated island we were on all week (in fact, the only populated island). Accessibly via sketchy plane and private yacht, making it an interesting mixture of locals, a handful of cruisers (like the Sharps), and very wealthy folks – half totally pretentious and half totally crusty.

Once we arrived in Staniel Key a woman who worked at the airport (which was a building the size of our living room) was nice enough to give us a ride on her golf cart to the yacht club, where the Sharp’s boat was.

Here are the girls in the back of the golf cart.

We met up with the Sharps at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club, which had one of two restaurants on the island. It also had a large group of Nurse sharks that hung right in the water outside. They congregate there because it’s where the fisherman throw their scraps. They’re not aggressive, so the girls could go down and pet them.

 

SUNDAY

On Sunday we went snorkeling in Thunderball Grotto, made famous by the James Bond Thunerball movie. It was a cave that you had to hit right at slack tide, otherwise it was too hard to get into. Once inside it opened up to this amazing space that was lit from above by an opening. There were thousands of fish. It was pretty incredible. Sophie snorkeled with us, Lauren didn’t want to leave the boat.

Dave brought his go pro – here’s one of the videos.

After the Grotto we left Staniel and headed to Shroud Cay. It was about a four hour boat ride. We anchored and took the dinghy and kayaks to this beautiful beach, which you got to via a winding waterway through mangroves.

Here’s a shot of Kathy prepping to lower the anchor. It was pretty amazing – the entire week we hardly saw other people. Each anchorage had maybe two or three other boats.

On the kayak trip to the beach we saw a lot of sea turtles, including this guy.

Me in the kayak.

Sunday night’s sunset. They were all pretty amazing – it was hard to pick just one to post.

MONDAY – WEDNESDAY

On Monday we left for Warderick Wells Cay. We planned on only staying there one night, but the wind really picked up and it was just too dangerous to leave – which I am not complaining about because this place was amazing. I’ve certainly been “stuck” in worse places.

Here’s Warderick Wells.

The tides are pretty extreme there, and when it’s high tide there are some cool intertidal zones. Every day we went and checked out what came in.

Here are the girls exploring.

One of the sharks that we saw. He was pretty small – maybe two feet. He was just waiting there for his dinner to float in.

We did a few hikes at this Cay, including one up to Boo Boo Hill, which was named after the sound the waves make crashing into the cliff.

Here’s a view from the top of Boo Boo Hill. The only non-sailboat is ours.

At the top to Boo Boo Hill people leave the names of their boats on pieces of drift wood. Sophie made a sign for So Many Stars and Dave screwed it in to remain for years to come.

Sophie with her sign.

A family shot on the way up to the top of Boo Boo Hill.

Monday night we celebrated Dave’s 67th birthday. Kathy had bought a cake from a woman who also ran the laundromat in Staniel Cay.

The next day Dave, the girls and I took a hike to another side of the island. We followed a path someone had marked with yellow paint.

…and ended up at another amazing beach – totally secluded.

This one was called Barefoot Beach.

On the main beach there was this huge skeleton of a sperm whale that had died and washed up on the beach years ago. There was a sign that said it had died by ingesting plastic. Later in the week we ended up on a beach that had a lot of plastic that had washed up on it – so we all moved it up to past the waterline, reminding the girls about the whale.

On our last day at Warderick Wells we took the dinghy to another area of the island we hadn’t explored yet and spent the day on the beach. The only other people we saw was a Canadian couple and their granddaughter, who were hiking around.

 

On most beaches were piles of rocks. Dave and the girls help to build this one.

THURSDAY

The winds finally calmed down enough for us to travel on Thursday and we headed to Cambridge Cay, which was about a two hour boat ride. It was another beautiful anchorage, and when we arrived we were the only boat there, other than a catamaran, which was there permanently to collect mooring fees.

Our first adventure was to an amazing area called The Aquarium, known for some the the best snorkeling in The Exumas. Unfortunately the go pro had gone dead by this point, so there’s not video. Lauren did snorkel with us this time.

Next up, we went to a small island that the girls “claimed” with flags.

First the girls hammed it up…

 

And then planted their flags.

The next adventure was a hike out to some blowholes.

 

Dave, his dad, and I went out on Thursday to check it out.

FRIDAY

The next morning we did the blowhole hike again with the kids, Kathy, and Rosie the dog.

The landscape looked a little like Ireland.

Dave his dad and I also hiked to the top of a big hill not far from the blowholes.

Dave and Rosie at the top.

Me with the mooring in the background. A big yacht had joined us the evening before, so there ended up being three of us there.

Panoramic shot from the top of the hill.

After that we were off to see the swimming pigs.

Another two hour boat ride and we anchored right outside of Staniel Cay. We took the dinghy into see the famous pigs. To be honest, they were slightly terrifying. Some of them were huge, and they were very aggressive, coming right up to eat the food you hopefully brought for them (we brought carrots). Although other people were in the water, I wouldn’t let the girls get in, which they were not happy about. They did come right up to the boat though.

Lauren tossing the carrot because I was too afraid to let her feed him by hand. They were not very good at catching food in their mouths.

That night we had our last meal back at the Staniel Cay Yacht Club.

Not a great shot, but it’s one of the few group ones we got.

SATURDAY

All good vacations must come to and end. We took another golf cart back to the same sketchy plane and headed home.

One last shot of the group in front of the boat.

An amazing week!

 

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I sit here writing this blog post in the middle of the third major snow storm this month! March has certainly come in like a lion. I’m anxiously waiting for the lamb portion of the month.

At least it’s beautiful to look at!

Here are a few shots from our backyard from the last storm. The one we’re currently in is supposed to drop even more than the last two. We’ll see.

 

At least the girls have been enjoying themselves. They’ve missed a lot of school – we’re into summer days at this point. And they’ve been sledding a lot.

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This year Sophie auditioned for and made it into the Philadelphia Girls Choir, a pretty prestigious choir in the City, which is associated with the world renowned Philadelphia Boys Choir. She started with the group in September, and had her first concert in December. It was held at the Episcopal Cathedral on Rittenhouse Square and was amazing! There were 750 tickets available and they sold out.

Here she is at the house in her dress before leaving. She was so excited and also so nervous.

You can see her here, second row on the right.

The girls were allowed to audition for either a solo or a dance. Sophie got a dance part (back facing the camera with the braid). During one of the songs she stepped down and did a dance along with the song.

The choir is made up of three sections: Etude (ages 7+), Cantata (ages 10+), and Concerto (ages 12+). Each section sang a few songs on their own, and then the entire choir sang together. Each group was more impressive than the next. In the picture above Sophie is second row, center.

A shot of the entire choir with all three sections. Sophie is center, about second row.

Afterward she was so excited and happy, it was so great to see.

Doug, Vicki, Quinn, Carley, Mom, Dad, Becky, Ari, and Lydia all came to the concert and afterward we all went out to dinner. Here Dave and I are with Sophie in Rittenhouse Square before dinner. It was extra festive walking through the park, which was all decorated and ready for Christmas.

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On November 8th, I headed to the poles with the girls to proudly vote for who we all assumed would be the first woman president, Hillary Clinton. As the day progressed into the evening it became clear that a lot of the country did not feel the same way. I was up early on the morning of the 9th and felt a loss and devastation that I haven’t experienced before. I didn’t know what to tell the girls after months of talking about the importance of this election, specifically the importance for women and girls. Not only had Hillary not been elected, but instead a sexist, xenophobic, intolerant scumbag had been elected. I literally did not have the words to explain it to them. It’s now a month after the election and I’m past the mourning, but far from acceptance. In our home we continue to emphasize powerful female leaders and acceptance of all, but what they’re exposed to outside our house can be a different story. The girls are going to change and grow up a lot over the next four years and it is our goal to talk about and expose them to people and organizations who are working for equality acceptance so that this may never happen again.

Me and the girls after casting our vote for Hillary Clinton

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After 4 weeks Lauren finally got her cast off today! The docs took another round of x-rays and said all looks good and the bone is healing nicely. She now has a soft cast on for another 4 weeks, but at least we can take it off during the day and she can move her arm around. We were given a few exercises for her to do to help make it strong again. 
The happy girl. 

These were the screws that were in her arm! Can you believe how big they are?! They took them out like they were removing a nail – just pulled them right on out. Dave was with her and said she didn’t cry a tear. Better than I could have done! 
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Our own series unfortunate events. Lauren and I are now both sporting right arm casts – though hers is much more fabulous than mine. 

The events: Lauren breaks arm; though they’re not supposed to be, girls are wrestling; Lauren kicks Sophie in the mouth, front tooth comes out; tooth fairy climbs to top bunk, slips and falls on descent, breaks wrist. Dave has decided to keep his distance.

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This weekend Dave’s sailing buddy Joe and his long-time girlfriend  Kat, got married at Parvin State Park in New Jersey. It was a beautiful, low-key, outdoor wedding. Dave was in the wedding and his parents were there too.

Joe and his groomsmen, waiting for the bride

The Sharp Family
 Sophie and Lauren were living it up on the dance floor the entire party. Sophie got some extra special time with the bride, who spun her around until neither one could stand straight. 
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